Welcome to the 2010-2011 School Year

Wow, September is almost over and this is the first chance that I have had to update this blog. We’re already busy in the computer lab and all grades have completed their first project of the year in honor of International Dot Day!

Dot Day 2010

After enjoying the book, The Dot, all students created their own dot (or dots). Dot Galleries for Kindergarten through 4th Grade are now available on the Computer Lab Wiki – you can view them individually by going to the Techno Star Scrapbook page and selecting each grade. The galleries for 5th-8th grades will be added soon!

In addition to celebrating International Dot Day, students have also been learning and doing other things in the lab:

  • Kindergarten & 1st Grade have done some mouse exercises to learn or practice mouse skills
  • Kindergarten through 5th Grade have drawn (or are drawing) self-portraits using KidPix or Paint.
  • Middle School is busy reviewing how to format Book Reports and Science Labs and how to create Crossword Puzzles in Excel.

Starting in October, 4th through 8th Grades will be getting their very own class blogs where they will be updating what is happening in the lab themselves!

Computer Lab News: Weeks 21-29 – 1st Grade

1st Grade began their work in the lab in February by finishing their Penguin Math Books. These and the completed Penguin Glyphs will be shared on their page on the Winter Wonderland Wiki very soon. For Valentine’s Day, 2nd Grade did some graphing of Valentine’s hearts in Excel. We visited the Necco web site to learn how Conversation Hearts are made. Each student then got a box of Conversation Hearts which they grouped by color and counted. Then each student entered their numbers in the Excel spreadsheet found on the Activities page to create their graph. All of the results were combined on to a single spreadsheet and you can see the results on the 1st Grade Winter Wonderland Wiki page.

Much of the rest of February and March concentrated on keyboarding with the continued Adventures in Keyboarding focusing on letters “H” through “P”. In addition to this, 1st Grade also played the following keyboarding games which they can play online at home too:

March also brought World Math Day which is an International event with students from around the world competing against one another in mental math games to try to set a world record for the most correct math answers in a 2 day period – 2 days because the event ran during the time that it was March 4, 2009 anywhere in the world. 1st Grade participated in this event on March 5th and helped add 953 correct math answers to the world record. Here are just a few statistics from World Math Day:

  • 204 Countries represented
  • 12,647 Cities/Towns participating
  • 38,058 Schools participating
  • 1,952,879 Students participating
  • 452,682,682 Questions correctly answered

In celebration of St. Patrick’s Day, 1st Grade did a project about rainbows. They first watched an online book about how rainbows are formed and then each 1st Grader created Rainbow Alphabets in Microsoft Excel. This helped them to learn about rows, columns and cells and a little bit about formatting in Excel. The Rainbow Alphabets have been printed and sent home.

To celebrate Easter, 1st Grade first brainstormed ideas about Easter and we used an online tool called Wordle to create a picture of their ideas:

Wordle: 1st Grade Easter

After creating the Wordle, each 1st grader then drew an Easter picture in KidPix. These will be shared online soon.

In addition to everything else, 1st Grade also worked in Jumpstart 1st Grade this month.

Computer Lab News: Weeks 17-20

Wow, it’s February already and here’s what we did in the lab during January!

KINDERGARTEN: Kindergarten worked on learning more letters on the keyboard focusing on the letters “E” through “G” this month. Kindergarten once again concentrated on all things winter and the Winter Wonderland Project. The students watched some of the videos created by other schools involved with this project and they had fun seeing the pictures and singing along to the songs. For their contributions to the project this month, each Kindergarten student created a Penguin Glyph and completed a Penguin Math Book. You can see the finished projects on Kindergarten’s Winter Wonderland page. The book My Brother Loved Snowflakes was read to Kindergarten and they are currently creating their own snowflakes using KidPix in tribute to Wilson Bentley.

1ST GRADE: 1st Grade also spent most of their time this month working on winter things for the Winter Wonderland Project. The students watched some of the videos created by other schools involved with this project and dictated comments to be left for the other schools which were posted on the project wiki. For their contributions to the project this month, each 1st Grade student created a Penguin Glyph and completed a Penguin Math Book. These will be added to 1st Grade’s Winter Wonderland page very soon. 1st Grade also enjoyed the book My Brother Loved Snowflakes and drew their very own snowflakes in KidPix. In addition to the winter projects, 1st Grade also continued to work on their Adventures in Keyboaring completing letters “E” throught “G” this month.

2ND GRADE: The Winter Wonderland Project was also the focus for 2nd Grade this month. They started off the month by reading the Lookybook Penguins Everywhere. Then, they too completed Penguin Glyphs. In addition to just creating the glyph according to the directions, 2nd Grade learned how to rotate items in PowerPoint and to add clipart to their completed glyph. Each 2nd grader was assigned a type of penguin and had to find out how tall the penguin is, how much they weigh and what they eat and add this information to their glyph. You can see the completed glyphs and penguin information on 2nd Grade’s Winter Wonderland page. 2nd Grade is finishing up the Penguin Math Books this coming week and those will be shared once they are complete.

3RD GRADE: 3rd Grade also watched and commented on videos done by other schools in the Winter Wonderland Project and completed Penguin Glyphs. 3rd Grade also reviewed how to rotate items in PowerPoint and how to add clipart to their completed glyph. Each 3rd grader also included information about their assigned type of penguin on their glyph. This will be shared on 3rd Grade’s Winter Wonderland page very soon. 3rd Grade has also joined another collaborative project, The Monster Project. As an introduction to this project, 3rd Grade watched a video about adjectives and listened to the book, Many Luscious Lollipops. After reviewing what an adjective is, 3rd grade then created an Adjective Web about their favorite food.

4TH GRADE: 4th Grade began the new year by checking out who had taken their Christmas Tongue Twister challenges and then they listened to and commented on the December Voices of the World projects from the other schools. St. Martin’s was in charge of the January Voices of the World project and we had fun making our video of the song Make New Friends. You can check it out on our Voices of the World page. We can’t wait to see what the other schools do with this. Since January was a short month due to the winter break some of the schools are still working on this. 4th Grade isn’t involved with the Winter Wonderland Project since this is a K-3 project but they did spend some time working on projects inspired by this project. Wilson Bentley was introduced to 4th Grade through the book Snowflake Bentley. After this was read, 4th Grade used a template in PowerPoint to create a timeline of Bentley’s life and decorated it with appropriate clip art. 4th Grade then used PhotoFiltre to digitally alter Wilson Bentley’s snowflake images in the style of Rick Doble. The cinquain style of poetry was then reviewed and 4th grade created a slide in PowerPoint which contained their snowflake image(s) and a cinquain poem that they wrote about snow or winter or Wilson Bentley. They learned how to record in PowerPoint and they recorded themselves reciting their poem. A show of all of their snowflakes and poems will be coming soon.

5TH GRADE: Ask your 5th Grader about GMT or UTC and they should know what those are and be able to tell you the difference between California time and GMT. This month in computers was all about time for 5th Grade as they began working on the Time Zone Experiences project. 5th Grade started out the month with an introduction to the project and to Greenwich Mean Time. They were also introduced to how to edit a wiki and what a “wiki war” is. After taking a short quiz about time and a survey about when they go to bed and wake up, each 5th Grade student was assigned a Greenwich Mean Time. They have been working on editing our  wiki to add information about what time that is in California time and what St. Martin’s 5th Graders would normally be doing at that time of day. They are also using KidPix to draw a picture about what would normally be happening at that time and are adding that to their page on the wiki too. You can watch our progress on our Time Zone Experiences page. Once they have finished their pages on our wiki, they will be updating the Time Zone Experiences project with their information too.

6TH GRADE: Just before the Christmas break, 6th Grade began working on a research project about Christmas Around The World. Each student was assigned a country and had to make an outline in Microsoft Word about what Christmas is like in that country. They then created a PowerPoint presentation from their outline and used that information to create visual slides about Christmas in their country. Once their slides were complete, they narrated each slide. After their presentation was complete, they uploaded it to St. Martin’s account at Slideboom and then added their Slideboom presentation to our Christmas Around The World page. This project meant learning a lot of new skills and reviewing some previously learned: Outlining in Word, Creating a PowerPoint presentation from a Word outline, Recording narration on a slide, Making a sound play automatically on a slide, Transitioning slides, Uploading to Slideboom, Editing a Wiki. There a still a few students that haven’t quite finished but most of the completed presentations are available on our Christmas Around The World page. In addition to this project, 6th Grade also worked on their January Reflections for the A Room With a View project and reviewed some of the other school’s pictures and comments in this project.

7TH GRADE: 7th Grade spent the first week of the month completing their Human Genetics Final Reports an Cyber Bullying Glogs if those were not done. On Inauguration Day, 7th Grade watched a Dateline NBC video called Hope, Change & Symbolism and discussed how far the country has come. They also discussed what they thought the themes of President Obama’s Inauguration Speech was. The format of a formal letter was reviewed and then each student wrote a letter to the President. These have been mailed for any student that wanted their letter sent to the President. 7th Grade ended the month working on a project inspired by the Winter Wonderland Project. The book Snowflake Bentley was read to introduce 7th Grade to Wilson Bentley and then 7th Grade used Excel to create an illustrated timeline of Wilson Bentley’s life. After the timeline was complete, they then used PhotoFiltre to digitally alter Wilson Bentley’s snowflake images in the style of Rick Doble. Two styles of poetry were reviewed, cinquain and haiku, after which 7th Grade created a slide in PowerPoint which contained their snowflake image(s) and a poem that they wrote about snow or winter or Wilson Bentley. They learned how to record in PowerPoint and they recorded themselves reciting their poem. A show of all of their snowflakes and poems will be coming soon.

8TH GRADE: On Inauguration Day, 8th Grade also watched the Dateline NBC video called Hope, Change & Symbolism and discussed how far the country has come and what they thought the themes of President Obama’s Inauguration Speech was. The format of a formal letter was reviewed and then each student wrote a letter to the President. These have been mailed for any student that wanted their letter sent to the President. The rest of the month has been spent writing scripts for the first Social Studies podcast. The segments of this are currently being recorded and will be shared very soon.

Computer Lab News: Weeks 14-16

Wow, December was a busy month at St. Martin’s and not just in the Computer Lab!! I hope that all of you have had a wonderful Christmas. First, I’d like to share with you an online holiday card that I created for a collaborative project that Kindergarten through 3rd Grade are currently doing. All of the Kindergarten & 1st Grade students drew nativity pictures in KidPix and I used this to create our Holiday Card. You can see our card and a card created by another school in the project on the Winter Wonderland Holiday Cards page. And now, here’s a recap of what happened in the Computer Lab during December and a whole lot of projects for you to take a look at.

Kindergarten through 3rd Grade focused on the Winter Wonderland project during December. This is an online project for grades K-3 that includes winter-themed technology activities for December, January & February. Kindergarten-3rd Grade will be doing at least some of these activities during these months and reviewing the activities done by other schools.

KINDERGARTEN: Kindergarten worked on learning more letters on the keyboard focusing on the letters “C” and “D” this month. KidPix was put to good use drawing both Winter Wonderland pictures and Nativity pictures. The Winter Wonderland pictures were made into a video which also includes Kindergarten singing “Jingle Bells”. The Nativity pictures were used in our online Holiday Card and Kindergarten signed some real cards that we sent to a few of the participating schools in the Winter Wonderland project. Kindergarten also took holiday polls as part of the Winter Wonderland project and we graphed the results in Excel. And when we were all done with that, Kindergarten played some fun Christmas games on the Internet. Check out Kindergarten’s Winter Wonderland page to see their video and the results of our polls.

1ST GRADE: 1st Grade worked on keyboarding focusing on the letters “C” and “D”. We will be continuing this each week for most of the rest of the school year and will have a mini-alphabet book when we’re done. 1st Grade took the Holiday Polls for the Winter Wonderland project and created a Winter Wonderland video with pictures they drew in KidPix and a recording of them singing “Jingle Bells”. 1st Grade also drew Nativity pictures for our online Holiday Card and signed some real cards that we sent to a few of the participating schools in the Winter Wonderland project. Check out 1st Grade’s Winter Wonderland page to see their video and the results of our polls. 1st Grade even had some time just before Christmas to play some fun Christmas Games online. I’ve also posted 1st Grade’s Hand Turkeys that they created in November on our Travel Scrapbook so check those out when you get a chance.

2ND GRADE: 2nd Grade spent December focused on Winter Wonderland projects. First, they took the Holiday Polls for the Winter Wonderland project. They did this by filling out a form online on the Winter Wonderland wiki and submitting their answers. If you want to see the results of these polls for all the schools in the project, you can go to Winter Wonderland Holiday Polls and have a look. Then 2nd Grade drew pictures of what Winter Wonderland looks like to them and they sang “Jingle Bells” and were recorded during a computer class. Their pictures and their singing were combined to make a video. 2nd Grade wasn’t done with Winter Wonderland yet though. They also created Gingerbread Houses in Excel by coloring cells based on a template and then adding clipart to decorate their houses. You can see 2nd Grade’s video and their Gingerbread Houses on their Winter Wonderland page. I have also posted 2nd Grade’s Pumpkin Math Books and their November projects on their Online Autumn page – make sure you check these out too!

3RD GRADE: 3rd Grade completed Winter Wonderland activities during December. First, they took the Holiday Polls for the Winter Wonderland project. They did this by filling out a form online on the Winter Wonderland wiki and submitting their answers. If you want to see the results of these polls for all the schools in the project, you can go to Winter Wonderland Holiday Polls and have a look. When the polls were done, 3rd Grade drew pictures of what Winter Wonderland looks like to them and they sang “Jingle Bells” and were recorded during a computer class. Their pictures and their singing were combined to make a video. 3rd Grade also created Gingerbread Houses in Excel by coloring cells based on a template and then adding clipart to decorate their houses. When they completed their Gingerbread Houses, they were able to play some Gingerbread or Christmas Games. You can see 3rd Grade’s Winter Wonderland video and their Gingerbread Houses on their Winter Wonderland page. 3rd Grade’s “What I Am Thankful For” and “Turkey Glyph” projects are also now available on our Travel Scrapbook – check them out!

4TH GRADE: 4th Grade completed the December activity for their online project, Voices of the World.  You can see this on their Voices of the World page and check out all of the other voices on the Voices of the World wiki. Do you know how to say Peace, Love, Hope and Joy in other languages? You can find out at Voices of the World! 4th Grade has also started working on their keyboarding skills using Sponge Bob Typing. 4th Grade’s Christmas project was a fun one. They selected a Christmas Tongue Twister and illustrated it and then added it to our Tongue Twister VoiceThread where they said the Tongue Twister and then challenged others to say it too. Students from a school in New Jersey have taken their challenges and you can hear them on the VoiceThread too! Can you meet the challenge? Set up a VoiceThread account (it’s free) and try it! 4th Grade’s Internet Safety Posters and their Persuasive Turkeys have been added to our Travel Scrapbook. Make sure you take some time to look at these too.

5TH GRADE: 5th Grade spent some time keyboarding in Mavis Beacon this month and they did a fun Christmas Typing activity. They were challenged to type the lyrics to a song using Microsoft as they listened to the song. Try this – it’s harder than you think. Once they were done with the lyrics, they had to add at least one clip art picture to decorate their lyrics. 5th Grade also completed a spreadsheet in Excel in order to figure out how many presents were received in total for the 12 Days of Christmas. Do you know? Ask your 5th Grader! 5th Grade’s Internet Safety Posters and their Persuasive Turkeys have been added to our Travel Scrapbook – check them out. We will be starting an online collaborative project in January and this requires that each 5th Grader return a signed Wiki Warranty. If you have not seen and signed this, please download it from here, discuss it with your 5th Grader and sign and return it to school.

6TH GRADE: 6th Grade completed their reflections for December and posted them to the discussions tab on their A Room With A View page. Head over to the page to check out the photos so far and read the reflections by clicking on the Discussions tab and then on each month. 6th Grade also tried the lyrics typing. I bet they can still sing the chorus to the song! 6th Grade has started a Christmas Around The World project that we will finish when they get back in January. Each student is researching how Christmas is celebrated in a different country and is creating a PowerPoint presentation about it. They are learning how to use the Outline feature in Word to take their notes and then transfer that to a PowerPoint presentation.  6th Grade’s Cyber-Bullying Comics and their Persuasive Turkeys have been added to our Travel Scrapbook. Take a look!

7TH GRADE: 7th Grade continued to finish up their Cyber-bullying Glogs and analyzed the final results for the Human Genetics project. We will be finishing these up when we return from the Christmas break. 7th Grade also tried the type the lyrics activity. Ask them to sing you the chorus to the song! As their main Christmas activity, each 7th Grader was told that they won a shopping spree to one online store. They had to create a spreadsheet in Excel that would keep track of what they bought and keep a running total of what they spent including sales tax. The catch was they had to spend between $995 and $1000 including tax. They had fun shopping and most of them managed to spend within that $5 range. A few students figured out that some stores have loss-leader products that sell for nothing or almost nothing so they used these to hit the magic $1000 even total. Check out the Travel Scrapbook for 7th Grade’s Cyber-Bullying Glogs and their Persuasive Turkeys.

8TH GRADE: Did your 8th Grader come home singing some Christmas song you had never heard? That’s because they spent a class typing the lyrics as they listened. It’s much harder than you think but there were a few students who got almost all the lyrics correct! 8th Grade also went on a Shopping Spree this month – okay not a real one but they did get to window shop. Before they could shop, each student had to create a spreadsheet in Excel that would keep track of what they bought and keep a running total of what they spent including sales tax. Then they could go and shop but the catch was they had to spend between $995 and $1000 including tax. They had fun shopping and most of them managed to spend within that $5 range. A few students figured out that some stores have loss-leader products that sell for nothing or almost nothing so they used these to hit the magic $1000 even total. Check out the Travel Scrapbook for 8th Grade’s Cyber-Bullying PSAs and their Persuasive Turkeys.

Computer Lab News: Week 11

KINDERGARTEN: Kindergarten reviewed the parts of the computer by singing Our Computer Song and they visited some age appropriate web sites: Peep & the Big World and Poisson Rouge. Kindergarten also began their introduction to keyboarding by meeting our mascot A Silly Dancing Frog, Giggles and using the web site Key Seeker along with green & purple stickers on their hand to begin to find letters on the keyboard using two hands. They also started working on their Adventures in Keyboarding project in PowerPoint. Each week in class they will be typing words that begin with a specific letter of the alphabet. This week they typed A words. After they finished their typing, they visited Caillou’s Magic Keyboard.

1ST GRADE: 1st Grade was reintroduced to A Silly Dancing Frog, Giggles and Harry (the) Jazzy Koala (with a) Little Semi and visited the web site Key Seeker to reinforce typing with two hands. They then completed the A page of their Adventures in Keyboarding project. Like Kindergarten, 1st Grade will also be completing one letter a week as their typing practice. In addition to typing, 1st Grade also used the educational software program, Jumpstart 1st Grade.

2ND GRADE: 2nd Grade only had computers once this week and concentrated on keyboarding with a re-introduction toe Giggles and Harry to help learn the keys on the homerow. They then completed Stage 1 on the Dance Mat web site. 2nd Grade will be using this site as their primary keyboarding site this year.

3RD GRADE: 3rd Grade only had computers once this week and some of them were still working on their Plant Life Cycle projects in KidPix. Many of the students are done so they went to Tutpup and played math or spelling games against one another or other students around the world.

4TH GRADE: 4th Grade only had computers once this week and reviewed and discussed their Cyber Safety quizzes and Cyber Safety issues.

5TH GRADE: 5th Grade reviewed and discussed their Cyber Safety quizzes and Cyber Safety issues. They also worked on completing their Cyber Safety posters in PowerPoint and All About Me projects in KidPix. These are complete and will be shared soon. Once they were done they played some Internet Safety games and during the last 15 minutes of class they went to Tutpup and played math or spelling games against one another or other students around the world.

6TH GRADE: 6th Grade only had computers once this week and they worked on finishing up their Cyber Bullying Comics in Microsoft Word and writing their November Reflections for our A Room With A View project.

7TH GRADE: 7th Grade completed their Electoral Votes spreadsheets in Microsoft Excel for St. Martin’s voting and reported their results. They then worked on their Cyber Bullying Glogs.

8TH GRADE: 8th Grade completed their Electoral Votes spreadsheets for St. Martin’s voting and reported their results. They then worked on their Cyber Bullying Animoto videos.

Computer Lab News: Weeks 6-8

There were some problems with our blog host and I wasn’t able to update the blog for a couple of weeks. The issues seem to be resolved so hopefully there won’t be problems in the future.

KINDERGARTEN: Kindergarten spent Week 6 learning about Internet Safety. They were introduced to the characters at NetSmartzKids.org through the activities at Clicky’s Web World and were all awarded a Clicky’s Web World Certificate. Did you see it? During Week 7, Kindergarten was introduced to their on-line collaborative project called Online Autumn. They were shown a map of where all of the other schools participating are located and viewed a few of the projects already completed. They also listened to and watched the pictures of an online book, Leaf Jumpers and created a pumpkin picture in KidPix. Week 8 brought more activities about Autumn. Kindergarten has recorded a song called 10 Little Pumpkins and we will be showcasing all of their pumpkin pictures set to this song in the near future. They also completed a My Pumpkin Math Book using PowerPoint. This also featured their pumpkin pictures as the last page of the book. These were printed as mini books for each student to take home and share. If this didn’t make it home or if you would like to see what the other students in Kindergarten did, here’s a slide show of all of the books:

1ST GRADE: Week 6 was Internet Safety Week for 1st Grade. They were re-introduced to the characters at NetSmartzKids.org through the activities at Clicky’s Web World and were all awarded a Clicky’s Web World Certificate. Did this make it home for you to see? During Week 7, 1st Grade was introduced to their on-line collaborative project called How Tall is a First Grader. They were shown an interactive map of where some of the other schools participating are located. They then watched a short video clip from a show called Math is Everywhere and read an online book called Measuring at the Dog Show and then they played some online measuring games. Week 8 brought a seasonal activity and the creation of Pumpkin Math Books. There are still a few of these being worked on but they will be printed and shared online when they are all complete. Since 1st Grade had just completed some work with the states of the United States in Social Studies they also played some online USA States games if they had completed their Pumpkin Math Books.

2ND GRADE: During Week 6, 2nd Grade worked on their Favorite Things About Autumn pictures in KidPix and reviewed the parts of the desktop using a PowerPoint presentation. They also used the program Jumpstart 2nd Grade. Internet Safety was the focus for 2nd Grade during Week 7. They were re-introduced to the characters at NetSmartzKids.org through the activities at Clicky’s Web World and were all awarded a Clicky’s Web World Certificate. Did this make it home for you to see? They all fondly remember NetSmartz and had fun playing some games on that site during the week. It was back to Autumn projects during Week 8 with the creation of Pumpkin Math Books. These will be shared online soon as will the Favorite Things About Autumn pictures.

3RD GRADE: All About Me pictures were the focus of Week 6 and 3rd Grade continued to work on these. They’re still not all done so be looking for these to come home during November when we have a chance to get back to them. Week 7 was Internet Safety Week for 3rd Grade. 3rd Grade participated in an interactive presentation from NetSmartz all about how to be safe on the Internet. Did you hear all about the WizzyWigs? After the presentation, 3rd grade played Internet Safety Games at NetSmartz Kids and continued to work on their All About Me pictures. Since 3rd Grade has been working on the Life Cycle of Plants in Science, they began a Life Cycle of Plants project in KidPix during Week 8. They are creating a title page illustration and four pictures to show the life cycle of a flowering plant. They will then create a slide show of their pictures which we will export and share here in a few weeks.

4TH GRADE: During Week 6, 4th Grade continued to work on their All About Me pictures. Most of these are done but a few are still not complete. They will be printed once they are all finished. Weeks 7 and 8 were focused on Internet Safety. 4th Grade watched a series of videos about Internet Safety and answered quizzes after each video. The wrap up to their Internet Safety unit will be a discussion of the quiz results and the creation of an Internet Safety Poster. These will be shared online when they are complete.

5TH GRADE: 5th Grade continued to work on their All About Me pictures during Week 6. Most of these are done but a few are still not complete. They will be printed once they are all finished. Internet Safety was the focus of Weeks 7 and 8. 5th Grade watched a series of videos about Internet Safety and answered quizzes after each video. The wrap up to their Internet Safety unit will be a discussion of the quiz results and the creation of an Internet Safety Poster. These will be shared online when they are complete.

6TH GRADE: Most of 6th Grade finished their All About Me bios in Word during Week 6. They also did their Daily Typing assignment on one of the days this week and wrote their reflections of September in Word. Week 7 and 8 were focused on Internet Safety. 6th Grade watched and discussed a video called Adina’s Deck which focuses on Cyber Bullying. They are currently working on creating comics using the drawing tools in Microsoft Word about Cyber Bullying. When these are completed they will be shared online. In addition, 6th Grade also completed their October reflections in Word and learned how to add them to the discussion section of their A Room With A View page. Make sure you visit the A Room With A View page each month as 6th Grade adds to this project throughout the year. NOTE: In order to be able to maintain the information on the wiki, all 6th graders must return a signed Wiki Warranty form. If you have not seen and signed this, please do so as soon as possible!

7TH GRADE: 7th Grade continued to work on their collaborative project, Human Genetics: A Worldwide Search for the Dominant Trait, during weeks 6-8. They were introduced to Google Docs and worked together in small teams to write portions of our introduction letter for the project. This will be online on the wiki once it is submitted to the project. They also completed a genetic trait survey of their class and each 7th grader surveyed either 6th or 8th grade for a specific trait. This data was all recorded in an Excel spreadsheet and the totals will be submitted to the Human Genetics project in the next week or so. During Week 7, 7th Grade watched a video called Adina’s Deck which focuses on Cyber Bullying. We will be discussing this video and creating a Cyber Bully Glog during November.

8TH GRADE: During Week 6, 8th Grade completed their Wiki Profiles to include information about what they hope to learn from working with the wiki this year. Week 7 and 8 were focused on Internet Safety. Like 6th & 7th Grades, 8th Grade also watched and discussed a video called Adina’s Deck which focuses on Cyber Bullying. 8th Grade has also begun creating Public Service Announcements about Cyber Bullying using PowerPoint and Animoto. These will be shared online when they are complete. 8th Grade also voted on their choice for the yearbook cover. Do you want a sneak peek at the cover?

Computer Lab News: Week 4

2ND GRADE – 8TH GRADE:

All students in grades 2 through 8 are adding their opinions about their Summer Reading Books to our Summer Reading VoiceThread. We are still recording some grades and/or students but you can check out what we have so far:

KINDERGARTEN: We continued to review the parts of the computer both by singing Our Computer Song and by learning about the desktop using a PowerPoint presentation:


Uploaded on authorSTREAM by stmcomputers

Kindergarten also continued working in KidPix this week creating pictures using different size stampers and the pencil tool. They also spent some time on the Starfall web site. This is a wonderful site for pre-readers to early readers with many activities at each level.

1ST GRADE: This week 1st Grade also learned about the Computer Desktop and sang Our Computer Song to review the parts of the computer that they already know. They also spent time in KidPix reviewing the bent pencil tool, stamps and the flood fill tool. 1st Grade created pictures of a hill and added stamps to make their hill all their own. These were printed and the students could take them home. I hope that you all had the chance to see your child’s creation. In addition, 1st Grade also spent time on the Starfall web site.

2ND GRADE: 2nd Grade continued to work on their initial letter sounds ABC Chart using stamps in KidPix. We will be printing these and sending them home next week. The students in 2nd Grade also began to add their voices to the VoiceThread above. Check out their reviews. A few of the students do not have avatars yet – these will be added once they are completed – and a few of the students were absent.

3RD GRADE: 3rd Grade continued to work on their initial letter sounds ABC Chart in KidPix using stickers. We will be printing these and sending them home next week. 3rd Grade will be adding their voices to our Summer Reading VoiceThread next week.

4TH GRADE: 4th Grade wrote their Summer Book Reviews in Word and began recording these on our Summer Reading VoiceThread. Scroll back up to the top and listen to those that have been completed. We will be continuing to record the rest of 4th Grade next week. We also began an All About Me project in KidPix.

5TH GRADE: The focus for 5th Grade this week was to complete their written Summer Book Review in Word and to record those on our Summer Reading Voice Thread. Most of the class has completed this so scroll back to the top and check out what 5th Grade had to say about F is for Freedom. Since 5th Grade had to recite the preamble this week, they were also given the opportunity to review this by playing an Unscramble The Preamble game or by watching a video:

Some of the 5th Graders also helped donate rice to those in need by playing the Free Rice game while they were waiting to record their reviews. Once they were done with their reviews, 5th Grade started an All About Me project in KidPix.

6TH GRADE: Since the next book report due in English requires a Crossword Puzzle, this week 6th Grade learned how to create one using Excel. 6th Grade also worked on their Summer Reading Book Reviews in Word and began recording these on our VoiceThread. There have been a few issues with background noise or microphones that seem to cut out so some students didn’t get a chance to record yet and some need to re-record their reviews. They will be doing this next week. 6th Grade also spent part of one day doing their Daily Typing exercise and some began working on an All About Me project in Word.

7TH GRADE: 7th Grade learned how to create a Crossword Puzzle using Excel since their next book report requires a crossword puzzle. They also worked on their Summer Reading Book Reviews in Word and began recording these on our VoiceThread. We will be finishing these next week but scroll up and listen to 7th Grade’s opinions so far about Where The Red Fern Grows. 7th Grade also set up their folders on their computers and completed a Daily Typing exercise. 7th Grade will usually be typing once a week for approximately 15 minutes.

8TH GRADE: 8th Grade also learned how to create a Crossword Puzzle using Excel since their next book report requires a crossword puzzle. They also worked on their Summer Reading Book Reviews in Word and began recording these on our VoiceThread. Most of the 8th Graders have completed these but we will be finishing those who haven’t next week. Scroll up and listen to their opinions. 8th Grade also completed a Daily Typing exercise. They will usually be typing once or twice a month for approximately 15 minutes. Most 8th Graders type well so we will not be focusing on this as much this year. There may be exceptions for some of the students who have not yet memorized the keyboard.